S1: It's time for Midday Edition on KPBS. As the Democratic National Convention draws closer. We're talking about the run up to Election Day and what voters care about most. Here's to conversations that keep you informed , inspired , and make you think. The new energy behind the Democratic presidential nominee and her running mate.
S2: And since Kamala Harris has become the Democratic nominee , there's been a flood of memes , particularly from sort of Gen Z voters spreading this idea of Kamala Harris as a brat summer candidate.
S1: Plus , we'll talk about immigration policy and what matters most to Gen Z voters. That's ahead on Midday Edition. And. The Democratic National Convention is next week , and Vice President Kamala Harris and her running mate , Minnesota Governor Tim Walz , will be center stage as Harris is expected to lay out her economic policies. But policies aside , pop culture is dominating the conversation around the presidential race. So today on the show , how is Harris's bid for the presidency being influenced by her California connection and the increasing influence of pop culture and social media ? Here to break down the unconventional lead up to the presidential election is Faith Pino. She is a politics reporter at the Los Angeles Times. Faith , welcome to the show.
S2: Hi , Jade. Thank you so much for having me.
S1: I'm glad to have you here. So a lot has happened in the world of national U.S. politics over the past few months , and that's to say the least. There was an assassination attempt on Republican nominee and former President Donald Trump. President Joe Biden dropped out of the 2024 race , and now the Bay area's own vice president , Kamala Harris , has been nominated for the top of the Democratic ticket.
S2: I mean , we've seen essentially what normally takes a year or more and sometimes not even that in a presidential election squeezed into the last month and a half or so. Um , I've been covering this race since , I think , last September or so , and I've been telling everyone that the election was sort of a snooze fest until June 27th , which was when the debate between Trump and Biden happened , which really kicked off this crazy chain of events in the past month and a half. And now it's anything but a snooze fest.
S1:
S2: Um , you know , Democratic voters , many of them were saying they were going to support Biden no matter what. But the fact was , people were really tired of seeing the same two candidates that we had in 2020. A Trump Biden rematch was not something that most voters wanted. Um , and in fact , we did a lot of writing about how voters were feeling largely apathetic and bored with this race. Of course , you know , after the debate between Biden and Trump , Biden really revealed himself as someone who voters thought was going to be unfit to run again , never mind to win. And so with this replacement of Harris at the top , you know , voters on the Democratic side are jazzed up. Um , there's been an injection of momentum in her campaign. Lots of fundraising , lots of traveling , lots of volunteers signing up from all corners of the party. On the Republican side , there's been a bit of a scramble , I would say , to figure out how to message against Harris. You know , the Trump campaign had built out quite an infrastructure for how they were going to defeat Biden. And for a couple months there , it seemed like they were just cruising to a victory. That's the sense that volunteers had that people on the campaign team felt. And then with this sort of last minute switch up , they're having to completely rejigger their messaging and figure out how to attack a candidate who is vastly different from Joe Biden.
S1: There's been all this excitement around Harris , but also now you have Waltz joining the ticket.
S2: Um , you know , Kamala Harris obviously is a is a very polished politician as vice president. You know , she's she's known internationally. And Tim Walz kind of is completely the opposite. He's not super polished. He sort of talks off the cuff. Um , few people really know who he was before he was announced as her running mate. Um , and he's kind of been catapulted into the spotlight here and , you know , on social media and among Democratic supporters , they're just eating it up. His , his sort of Midwestern dad vibes. Um , but yeah , he's Minnesota governor. He was a congressman before that and before that he was a teacher and a football coach. And he also served in the National Guard.
S1: And it sounds like a very different , um , presidential VP pick compared to JD Vance as well. Um , with Kamala Harris now at the top of the Democratic ticket , California is playing an even larger role than usual in the presidential race. So how are the donations and the portrayal of California influencing campaigns here ? Absolutely.
S2: California always plays a large role in fundraising for any candidate. We saw this during the primary season when the Republican contenders all came to California to try to , you know , stump for some cash in Orange County and Northern California and some places in LA. Um , the Democrats held their biggest fundraiser in Hollywood a couple months ago for Joe Biden at the time. It was hosted by George Clooney and Julia Roberts. So , you know , every kind of presidential cycle , we see these big time California donors rallying for their candidates. Um , this year , it's of course different because Kamala Harris is leading the Democratic ticket. She is very much California's own. She was raised in Northern California. Um , served , you know , as attorney general. And and she moved eventually to the Brentwood neighborhood in l Los Angeles. So she is very much a California woman , um , leading the ticket. And , you know , she chose Tim Walz , who's Midwestern born and bred. He was raised in Nebraska and then has lived as an adult in Minnesota. And he kind of balances out her ticket. Right. You know , if she had chosen someone from California or from the East Coast , it would probably be a too heavily coastal elite , sort of a ticket. But getting someone who's sort of as down to earth. Um , and Midwestern as Tim Walz sort of balances her out. It is funny , though , how Republicans right out the gate started trying to tie walls to California. Um , there was some messaging that walls was a , quote , West Coast wannabe that came out from the Republican campaign because of how he has led Minnesota and he has been a very progressive leader of the state. But , you know , obviously , California is very different from Minnesota. And so it's interesting to see how , um , you know , Republicans are still trying to pin the West Coast reputation on such a midwestern guy.
S1: Well , and also the Republican vice presidential nominee , JD Vance , I mean , he's also got ties. He moved to San Francisco in the 20 tens as a venture capitalist in the tech world.
S2: But after going to college at Ohio State and then going to law school at Yale , he moved to the Bay area and started a really thriving venture capitalist career. Um , and it was the people that he met in San Francisco , which I think really paved the way for him to rise to this level of , uh , of politics. Um , he became a mentee of Peter Thiel , uh , who was on the PayPal co-founders and has is one of those big time venture capitalists. Um , Thiel funded his Vance's campaign for Senate in Ohio. And also Thiel has connections to Donald Trump. He previously , um , supported his candidacy in 2020. So folks like Peter Thiel and his donors have certainly backed Vance. I think Vance learned a lot about how to work his way up in this kind of venture capitalist politics world , from his time in California. He's also married to a San Diegan , Usha Vance. She was born and raised in San Diego. They met in jail and have been married. And she quit her job , actually at a California based progressive law firm to help her husband with this campaign.
S1: Well , it seems half of the campaigning for this upcoming election is being done on social media. From what you've seen , what role is that and pop culture playing here ? Yeah.
S2: You know , this is such a uniquely 2024 election. Uh , it's there's so many kind of made for meme moments that have happened thus far. Um , I mean , going back to the debate , which really was the was the beginning of President Biden's downfall as a Democratic candidate. You know , there were all kinds of memes and little videos coming out of that debate that just swept across the internet and convinced people who don't normally pay attention to news or politics that Biden was unfit to lead the Democratic ticket. And then , you know , with the attempted assassination of Donald Trump , I mean , the fact that Trump was shot at fell to the ground and then immediately stood up with blood running out of his ear to say , fight , fight , fight. I mean , that was a made for social media moment. And those pictures , you know , spread like wildfire all across social media , even as people were still trying to understand what had happened. And , you know , there was all kinds of misinformation spreading across social media. So there have been these major campaign moments that just really take off. And since Kamala Harris has become the Democratic nominee , there's been a flood of memes , particularly from sort of Gen Z , uh , voters spreading this idea of Kamala Harris as , as a bright summer candidate. Um , and this was sort of a social media sensation that had taken off , uh , from certain music albums and things. And Harris is sort of was made queen of this brat summer and her laugh has gone viral. Certain comments that she's made.
S1: Well , okay.
S2: So being a bit blunt , you know , being really honest , even if it doesn't hit exactly easily , um , it might be a little messy , but it's just owning who you are. And I think voters , especially young Gen Z voters , really latched on to Harris as this embodiment of bread. You know , she's coming out here with her laugh , um , with her , her meme quotes , and she's just being fully herself in a way that I think young voters see is really authentic , interesting.
S1: And then another pop culture moment here , I think , is her running mate Tim Walz interjecting weird into the conversation here. Tell me about that. Yeah.
S2: Yeah. So Walz brought this kind of side door insult against the Trump Vance campaign a while back , and it really took off when Kamala Harris was looking for running mate. So in an interview , you know , Tim Walz was going around all these networks giving interviews about , um , you know , stumping for the Biden campaign way back , uh , feels like months ago at this point. And during one interview , he mentioned that , you know , these these Trump ideas are just weird. And it kind of gave permission , I think , to a lot of Democrats , to just be honest about how they felt about the other side. And the Biden campaign had been really trumpeting this sort of doom and gloom message. And we have to save democracy. And Trump is a threat to democracy. Um , and certainly that message resonated with a lot of voters and was the reason that a lot of voters were planning to support Biden. But I think walls came in and just gave them permission to be a little lighter and to just write off the Trump campaign. And that weird messaging really took off. Harris started using it herself even before she chose Wallace as her running mate. And he has capitalized on this. He says weird at pretty much every campaign stop he's at. And this is sort of his branding. Hmm.
S1: Hmm.
S2: He announced his presidency , I think it was on a video that he posted online. And , you know , as a young candidate , he had to connect with young audiences , and that's where they're at. So he met them there. Um , but yeah , I think , you know , in 2020 , we saw a lot of internet usage just because we were in the middle of Covid. And so people were sort of glued to the internet and watching the campaigns take off on their phones. But this year , I mean , it it really is like , this is a this is an internet age campaign. And I think , you know , some people have been saying they will vote this November based on vibes. And I think vibes are really essentially what people collect from watching these campaigns on social media. That's not to say that there isn't obviously a lot of in-person , um , you know , rallying and volunteering and whatnot that's happening on both sides. But I think people are more than ever paying attention to how these candidates appear on their phones , on social media.
S1: Well , also playing a big role in the presidential race is racial and cultural identity. For example , the numerous affinity groups that immediately raised millions when Harris was endorsed as the presidential nominee.
S2: But with Kamala Harris now leading the Democratic ticket , you know , she is a black and Indian American woman. Um , and then on the Republican side , although she's not a candidate , J.D. Vance , his wife , Usha Vance , is also an Indian woman , also from California. So we have these two Indian American women from California who will somehow be connected to the white House. Um , come , you know , November. So it's really interesting. As soon as Harris became the lead , you know , as you mentioned , there was a black woman for Harris call that happened just hours after she was endorsed. Um , the next night , there was black men for Harris , white women for Harris , white dudes for Harris , South Asians. I mean , just on and on and on. These affinity groups have really sprung up in support for her. And you don't see that in the same way on the Republican ticket. And , you know , we've seen a lot more support from black and Latino people , particularly men for Trump this year. But that was before Harris started leading the Democrats. So I think it's a little too early to tell where that support is going to go. You know , there are still some undecided swing voters , but overall , having a black and Indian American woman leading the Democrats is a big moment. You know , for the party to have , first of all , their first black candidate and Barack Obama a few years ago and now their first black woman. Um , it says a lot. And I think the Democratic Party is also very multiracial itself. Um , and so they want someone who represents who they are.
S1: Well , with that , what can people expect to come from the Democratic National Convention coming up next week ? Yeah.
S2: So next week will sort of be , I think , a victory lap of sorts for Harris and Walls. We saw much like that at the Republican convention when Trump had just recently survived from his attempted assassination. Um , and he had just named J.D. Vance as his vice presidential running mate. So the Republican convention was really a big party. Everyone's celebrating that Trump was still alive and getting excited about his VP. And I think although obviously Harris did not survive an assassination attempt , her becoming this sort of last minute candidate and then picking someone who is as likable as walls as her running mate , um , will will be sort of a fun and joyous atmosphere. That's certainly what they're preparing for at their rallies. You know , they talk a lot about joy and about hope and bringing freedom to their party. I think we'll also be prepared to see some protests. You know , for months in the making , there have been these protests planned , you know , for pro-Palestinian anti Biden administration's handling of the Israel-hamas conflict. And , you know , I'm already getting calls and messages about a couple of different protests plan during the week in Chicago. And so it's going to be hot. It's going to be Electric , and there's going to be a lot happening in Chicago next week.
S1:
S2: That is one of the top concerns for Republican voters this year as well as the economy. You know , voters are still pretty unhappy with how high inflation is , even though the economy by other metrics is doing fairly well. And so , you know , already we've seen Trump and Vance really capitalizing on that discontent in their campaign messaging. So I expect to see a lot more of that. Um , for the Harris Waltz ticket , you know , it's it's kind of early to tell. Um , so far we've heard quite a bit about , you know , abortion access , which is an issue that Harris long championed as vice president and now is really capitalizing on her presidential bid. Um , but also , she's saying that she will be rolling out her economic messaging this week. So we're expecting to hear a bit more of that , you know , trying Harris , trying to take credit for how well the economy is doing now and attributing it to her administration.
S1:
S2: Labor day is coming. And that always kind of marks the the final sprint to the Election day. So I think we'll see a lot more in-person events. Um , I think the Republican Party presumably will will get their messaging together , um , against , you know , the Harris Wall's ticket. They're having to do a lot of reorganizing right now , and we can see a lot more attacks. I mean , the next big thing to look forward to after the DNC is the September 10th debate that just last week , Trump agreed he would face Harris for this debate. She has , you know , kind of long called for this , uh , face to face off against him. And we'll see. Maybe there will be a couple other debates down the line.
S1: All right. I've been speaking with Faith Pannu , politics reporter for the Los Angeles Times. Faith , thanks for joining us.
S2: You're welcome. Thanks for having me.
S1: Coming up , the impact Republican rhetoric around immigration is having on San Diego communities and what voters are looking for out of the DNC.
S3:
S1: Welcome back to KPBS Midday Edition. I'm Jade Hindman. We just heard about how California is taking center stage during the lead up to the presidential election here in San Diego County , one of the most direct impacts from the election could be seen along the US-Mexico border. Immigration has been a key issue that has been highlighted by both parties. Here to speak on what the election could bring for San Diego County's border region is Gustavo Solis. He's the border reporter at KPBS. Gustavo , welcome back to the show.
S3: Hello , Jade. Thanks for having me.
S1: So glad to have you , as always.
S3: Uh , right. I think the newest one is this restriction on asylum at the southern border that has really contributed to a reduction in apprehensions. We're seeing lower numbers than we've seen even before the pandemic now , which a lot of people are talking about. But I would I would say that throughout his administration , Biden has really embraced the carrot and stick approach to immigration policies. Right. And that's you balance enforcement with increased access and pathways to to enter the country and even citizenship , you know , the carrot and the stick. One of the big criticisms of that approach is that in the last couple of years , there's been a lot more stick and not enough carrot. And we've kind of seen this shift , uh , more towards the center when it comes to immigration enforcement policies from the Democratic Party.
S1:
S3: I mean , Trump's policies were in many cases designed to be cruel , right ? I'm thinking of the zero tolerance policy that , um , deliberately separated children from their parents as a deterrent method to prevent other migrants from trying to cross the country illegally. Um , to this day , the US government has not returned all of those children to their parents. It has been more than four years. Um , remain in Mexico. A lot of people , these were asylum seekers that were trying to make their way through the court and really figure out if they qualify for asylum protection. They were forced to stay in Mexico. Even now , on the campaign trail , uh , the uh , Trump fans ticket are bragging about this policy and bringing it back. The problem is that while people were in Mexico , uh , these asylum seekers , a lot of them were beaten , robbed , uh , sexually assaulted. They were put in really great danger and in vulnerable situations. So , yeah , those policies really , really didn't get a lot of support from folks who support , you know , humanitarian efforts and that type of migration. Yeah. Mhm.
S1: Mhm. Well , like you mentioned with Harris now locked in at the top of the Democratic ticket , it's looking to be a close battle between Harris and Trump in the presidential election this November , based on both of their political histories.
S3: We could potentially see it , you know , cranked up to 11 , right ? I think anyone who's seen rallies and even the RNC noticed the mass deportation signs for the community here in San Diego. That would be a fear uncertainty , right ? Remember at the beginning of the Trump administration , just folks were getting picked up at schools , at churches , um , at courthouses. I remember in Los Angeles there was a decline in nine , 11 calls from neighborhoods where a lot of immigrants live. And that didn't mean there was less crime , that just mean people did not feel comfortable enough to call the police to report those crimes. So unfortunately , that could be a big , uh , risk. We could kind of go back to that kind of cycle under Trump , uh , with , uh , Vice President Harris. It's a little bit more difficult to kind of figure out what that would look like. Obviously , it would be a lot of continuation of what Biden is already doing , and it's unclear how much he's willing to separate from the administration that she is currently a part of right now. So I think that will be kind of interesting to see as the campaign progresses. Just where she differentiates herself from Biden on some of these issues.
S1:
S3: And that's on like many different levels , right ? One , it would be challenged in court. But I think more importantly , like the logistics of it , right. We're talking about between 10 and 20 million people. There's not enough Ice agents to do that. There's not enough , um , detention spaces in , in facilities for that , let alone airplanes to fly these people , let alone diplomatic relationships with certain countries like Venezuela. Cuba will not accept deportation flights. So how do you deport people to countries that won't accept them ? I think I have heard both JD Vance and Donald Trump kind of not double down , but but provide a little bit more details , right ? The stated policy is mass deportation for all if you're undocumented. And that's the only factor , right ? If you're in this country undocumented , you will be deported. And more recent interviews , they kind of cut their hedges a little bit and said , look , we're going to prioritize criminals. We're going to prioritize folks who have records. Um , which is actually the same thing the Obama administration did. They had this policy that they prioritize folks with , with convictions. Um , so you can kind of see them , as they say , more of this policy. It won't be a blanket one , maybe. But , you know , who knows ? I mean , during the first four years of the Trump administration , one of the biggest issues was that they removed those priorities and just kind of did blanket deportations. And the big result of that was what they called collateral deportations , right ? They would be looking for one person in one house and anyone else who happened to live in that house and was also undocumented , even if they were , you know , a straight-A student or going to work all the time , or just had never had run ins with the police , they would still get caught up in that collateral enforcement. And that's what led to a lot of really just terrorizing immigrant communities around the country. Yeah.
S1: Yeah. Well , I mean , zooming out a little here , how would you describe the current state of immigration along the border in general ? And of course , right here in San Diego County ? Yeah.
S3: Well , I think I really like that question because it sounds so simple , right ? The current state of immigration. But folks who follow immigration know just how complex it is , right ? Are we talking about , um , a student visas ? Right. Are we talking about work visas ? Humanitarian visas ? Are we talking about , um , UCSD students , international students coming here on a work visa , graduating , getting this great education , wanting to put it to use in the community , but not being able to do so because they can't get a visa to stay at work. Right. Are we talking about Qualcomm ? Who is the , um , I think they get most of the H-1b visas to bring workers in here. It's very difficult to get those visas. And companies have to struggle and downsize because they can't get enough workers to fill those jobs. That's also part of immigration , right ? Are we talking about the immigration courts where there's a backlog of more than 5 million cases now ? So if you have a case in court , your life is kind of in limbo for a while. Uh , and that's not because you did anything wrong. Because but because our federal government hasn't invested in , uh , courts and judges to , to amplify that system. So no matter which way you look at it , I think The that phrase , right , our immigration system is broken. It also sounds very simple , but it speaks to all these different aspects that touch on our daily lives , economies and communities. Yeah.
S1: And when you have a system that's broken , then you have much more illegal immigration.
S3: Right. We go to Tijuana to talk to folks in migrant shelters. We go to to the shelters here in San Diego and the open air detention sites along the border. And it is a historic shift that we're seeing , right ? Immigration. Throughout much of the 90s and early 2000 , it was mostly single men from Mexico coming for economic opportunities. And slowly we've seen it shift from only Mexican men to Central American men. And if you'll remember more recently , the Central American unaccompanied children. And now we're seeing men , children from the Northern Triangle countries , uh , families from Central America and now South America , countries from West Africa , Asia , uh , people from all over the world. Eastern Europe , Middle East are also coming over here. So we are seeing this huge shift in the type of population that's coming and trying to enter the country legally , and that is putting a lot of pressure and and making the job of the Border Patrol very difficult because none of their facilities and even a lot of the laws that they use , they're not built with that population in mind. Right ? If you think about it , we created an immigration system in the 90s to account for a lot of single men coming for work. That includes the type of detention facilities that we put them , for instance. Now , where do you put , you know , parents with their children ? You you know , it's not really appropriate to put them in a prison style facility that really wasn't built for them. And those are some of the challenges that make this current time so , so difficult.
S1: And how many people are coming illegally now compared to past decades ? Yeah.
S4:
S3: Well , I will say now , just within the last two months , there's been a big reduction in apprehensions along the southern border. If you look at it. I mean , the numbers are still below what they were in historic highs of the , you know , 80s and 90s , but they are higher than they were during the the Obama administration. I will say now , for the first time during the Biden administration , they are lower now than they were during the Trump administration , even before Covid. Um , which is really interesting. I mean , here in San Diego , we we've seen that by the fact that there has not been any street releases in the last six weeks. Now , folks who follow this will know that street release is a is what Border Patrol does. When they have too many people in their custody , they will just drop them off at a transit station , most likely , etcetera. Um , the fact that there haven't been any street releases in six weeks tells you that they really haven't had that many people in their custody , or at least they haven't been overwhelmed by the amount of people in their custody. Hmm.
S1: Hmm. Well , the Republican National Convention happened last month.
S3: And I did watch a lot of the RNC. The main I know chorus , if you will , that I heard was , was this connection of migration and crime. Trump called it the Biden border migrant crime wave. And I think they're going to have to come up with a new name. Maybe it's the Harris migrant crime wave. Um , but it's incredibly easy to disprove that narrative , right ? A study after study shows that migrants , whether they're in the country legally or not , are less likely to commit crime than native born U.S. citizens. And actually , the best data ironically comes out of Texas , which is traditionally hard line state. But Texas will track the immigration status of people in their prison system , and you can see whether it's broken down by violent crime or property crime. Uh , US citizens who are born in this country are much , much more likely to commit crimes than migrants , whether they came into the country illegally or illegally. Now , obviously , the undocumented immigrant population is massive , right ? There's millions and millions of people , and in a population that big , there's going to be horrible people in it that do horrible things. So the Republican Party has no shortage of examples to kind of cherry pick , uh , all of them tragic , uh , examples of people , innocent people being killed by immigrants. So the they take these individual examples and kind of use them to paint a picture of an entire community.
S1: Yeah , yeah. Creating the stereotype is step one and dehumanizing a group of people.
S3: Yeah , exactly. Yeah.
S1: Yeah. Well , you know , the Democratic National Convention is happening next week.
S3: You know , early on in the Biden administration , there was a reluctance to talk about immigration , like they just didn't really want to engage. It almost seemed like the Republican Party was the one driving the narrative , and the Democrats were just kind of reacting to that. Um , there's been some reporting out this week and last week that the Harris campaign recognizes that , and they want to be more active when it comes to this conversation. Now , what that looks like , I don't really know. And I'm kind of very excited to to see how that plays out in the convention. Specifically , I'm curious to see how the progressive side of the of the party responds , because that has been one of the most disillusioned groups with Biden's policies. Right ? A lot of , uh , humanitarian activists , immigrant rights activists , the folks who helped Biden get elected when he ran on a platform to do away with Trump's inhumane migration policies. They feel that Biden hasn't done it enough. And they point to , you know , things like the latest executive order that restricted access to asylum as a way to say , like , hey , you promised one thing or you're delivering another thing. So I am very curious to see how Harris manages those types of relationships when it comes to immigration.
S1:
S4:
S3: Biggest thing to recognize is that part of the reason why the immigration system is broken right now and things seem so chaotic , is because there hasn't really been action by Congress and the Senate to pass comprehensive immigration reform. And in the absence of our elected officials , actually writing laws , then we're left with a patchwork of executive orders that vary by administration , court decisions from one lawsuit to another. It's really just like this wonky system that's reacting to executive orders and court decisions , trying to keep things running. But the people who actually can't do something about it are the folks we vote for down ballot. Right ? Folks in Congress , folks in the Senate.
S1: Well , all something that we will continue to follow. Gustavo Solis is the border reporter for KPBS news. Gustavo , thanks for your reporting. Thanks for joining us.
S3: Appreciate it. Thank you.
S1: Still ahead , a look at Alliance San Diego's efforts to engage and inform young voters.
S5: There is a lot of feeling of anxiety and dread , especially when it comes to voting , because there's so much going on at the national level.
S1: KPBS Midday Edition returns after the break. Welcome back to KPBS midday Edition. I'm Jade Hindman. While November's presidential election is taking much of the political spotlight , there are plenty of state and local elections plus ballot measures that will have a big impact on communities across California. That in mind , organizations here in San Diego are working to engage voters , especially young voters who have historically been less active. Alliance San Diego is one such organization. Jalen Choi is the civic engagement organizer. Jaelen , welcome to the show. Hi.
S5: Hi. Thank you for having me.
S1: So civic engagement is a big component of Alliance San Diego's efforts to reach voters. Can you tell me more about that ? Yeah.
S5: So our voter education and outreach entails , you know , talking to people at the doors. Um , we make phone calls and we text our communities just to make sure that they know that there's an election coming around the corner. And , you know , we are in August currently , but we just want to make sure that people have enough time and that they are aware that , you know , ballots drop the week of October 7th. And just to make sure that they use their voting power to make decisions that directly affect them.
S1:
S5: And so we focus on city council districts for eight and nine. And we just want to make sure that we do our outreach mainly to communities of color , women and young voters as well.
S1:
S5: And we saw that through the flooding that happened in January , where communities in southeast San Diego were disproportionately hit and impacted. We know that they have been historically ignored and underfunded. Underinvested however you want to say it.
S1:
S5: And a lot of what we're seeing is a lot of people that , you know that we want to talk to aren't there at all , especially when we're trying to , you know , make sure that we reach our people and that , you know , that they are voting in the election. And so part of the efforts that we have been doing in terms of our outreach is also through our digital efforts , like emailing registered voters or through our social media. And because we know that a lot of people get their news and information that way. So that's kind of what we've been doing despite of those challenges.
S1: Yeah , yeah , that's one innovative way to reach many people. This year , your organization chose to look at a youth focus group regarding San Diego County voters , and you led that effort. Talk about why this was an important strategy for the organization. Yeah.
S5: Yeah. So this year , specifically this election year , our staff and our board at ASD felt the need to prioritize and in engaging young voters , Gen Z voters , specifically in the in this election cycle. Because what we're seeing is that there's so much at stake , especially for me as a young voter. I know there's a lot of issues that concern me and that there's not a lot of awareness specifically at the state and local level. And so I really believe that , you know , as the young voter , like our vote is our future and that there's a lot of issues that directly affect youth and that we have a say in. And so at ASD , we really wanted to hone in and like center our attention on young voters , because young voters have a lot to say in this election. And the outcome.
S1:
S5: And so a lot of them shared that they have heard what's been going on at the national level with , you know , who's running for president and all that. But there was also some people who , you know , didn't know anything about the election , um , as this would be their first election that they're voting in. And so , um , some people didn't know where to start at all. And what we also heard from our You Focus group was that there is a lot of feeling of anxiety and dread , especially when it comes to voting , because there's so much going on at the national level that they themselves feel overwhelmed and that the weight of the election is on their shoulders. Another thing is that , um , a lot of you shared that there's a lot of misinformation in the news or on social media , and that they care more about the issues than the candidates. And that's where we want to come in , and that's what we wanted to hear because there were outreach efforts. You know , we want to just provide information about , you know , what's going on and about the issues that are on the ballot so that , you know , our youth can make their own decisions about those issues. Yeah.
S1: Well , are there any issues at the local level that are really concerning for them ? Yeah.
S5: So one of the things that we shared in our youth focus group was the ballot measures that are going to be on the ballot in November this year. And some of the things that we mentioned , or some of the issues that are on the ballot this year , concern , like rent control , um , raising the minimum wage , marriage equality and slavery in our state prisons. And these are things that , um , really resonated with our youth focus group. And what we heard was that they didn't know that these issues were on the ballot at all , that they can vote on these issues that , you know , concern them or that are important to them. And so when you know , they heard that , what's going to be on the ballot in terms of these ballot measures , they felt motivated to learn more and to share with their friends and family about these issues. Mhm.
S4: Mhm.
S1: Well , Jalen , being in your early 20s yourself , you haven't had the chance to vote in too many elections. What's at stake for you this year. Does it feel different than than years past as you've observed. Yeah.
S5: Yeah. So the first election that I voted in was during the pandemic in 2020. And honestly , it doesn't feel very different from , um , what was going on then versus now. For me , the reason why I vote myself or that I organize is because there's a lot of issues that directly , you know , concern me like , you know , the cost of living here in San Diego. Rent control. As a woman , my reproductive health is on the line as well. And also climate change. And so these are just some issues that directly affect me and and why I am voting myself and why I organize. But the feeling , um , that I felt in 2020 is , is not different because of how much is at stake , especially in this election.
S1:
S5: Um , we also are doing a lot of work on our social media because we know that people are consuming their news , their information a lot differently now. And so we have been working on our social media platforms like Instagram and even TikTok. Folks can also visit our website at Alliance Dawg , and we're also planning community events that , you know , target youth and so people can stay tuned and follow us on social media.
S1: I've been speaking with Jalen Choi. She's the civic engagement organizer for Alliance San Diego. Jalen , thank you so much for joining us.
S5: Thank you for having me. Appreciate it.
S1: That's our show for today. I'm your host , Jade Hindman. Thanks for tuning in to Midday Edition. Be sure to have a great day on purpose , everyone.